Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1887-05-20
DIR. TALMAGE'S SERMON,
Eloquent Discourse Concerning Good and
Bad Literature.

Eloquent Discourse Concerning Good and
Bad Literature.
'.Many of Them Also Which Used Curious
Arts Brought Their Books Together. and
Burned Them Before All Mem"
BROOKLYN, May 1.-At tho tabernacle
this morning the pastor, the Rev. L. De
the Proverbs of Solomon. The cengrega-
tion sang with magnificent effect tho hymn
beginning:
Arm of the Lord awake! awake!
Put on thy strength the nations shake.
DR.. Talmage took for his text Acts xix.
19: "Many of them also which used
curious arts brought their books together,
and burned them before all men; and they
counted the price of them, and found it
$4,000 pieces Of silver"
Paul had been stirring up Ephesus with
some lively sermons about the sins of that
place. Among the more important results
was the fact that the citizens brought out
their bad books, and in public place made
q bonfire OF them. see the people COM
ing out with their arms full of Ephesian
literature, and tossing it into the flames.
hear an economist standing by and saying:
"Stop this waste. Here are $500 worth
of books-do you propose to burn them all
up? IT you don't want to read them your
selves, sell them. and let somebody else
read Them" No." said the people, elf
these books are not good enough for us,
they are not good for anybody else. and we
shall stand and watch until the lastleaf has
turned to ashes. They have done us a
world of harm. and they shall never do
others HARM" Hear the flames crackle and
1oar
Well, my friends, one of the wants of
the cities of this country is great bonfire
of bad books and newspapers. We have
enough fuel to make blaze 200 feet high.
Many of the publishing houses would do
we'll to throw into the blaze their entire
stock of goods Bring forth the insuf1er-
eble trash and put it into the fire, and let it
be known, in the presence of God, and
angels, and men, that you are going to rid
your homes of the overlapping and under
lying curse of profigate literature.
The printing press is the mightiest
agency on the earth for good and for evil.
The minister of the Gospel, standing in a
pulpit, has responsible position; but do
not think il is as responsible us the position
OF an editor or a publisher At what
distant point OF time, at what far out cycle
Of eternity will cease The influence of q
Henry j. raymond, or q Horace Greeley,
or a James Gordon Bennett, or Watson
Webb, or an J rastus Brooks, or Thomas
kiMsella? Take the simple fact that our
New York tiaiiies now have circulation of
about $4,000 Ter day, and add to it the
Tact that three of our weekly periodicals
have an aggregate circulation of about
l,00o,00O, and then cipher, if you can, how
far up, and how far down, and how far out
reach the influences of the American print
ing press. Great God, what is to be the
issue of all this? l believe the Lord in
tends the printing press to he the chief
means for the worlds rescue and evange-
lization, and I think that the great last
battle of the world will not be fought with
swords and guns, but with types and
presses-a purified and Gospel literature
triumphing over. tramping down. and
crushing out forever that which is de-
}raved. The only way to overcome unclenn
literature is by scattering abroad that which
is healthful. May God speed the cylinders
OF an honest, intelligent, aggressive,
Christian printing press.
I have to tell YOU this m morning that the
greatest blessing that ever came to this
nation is that Of an elevated literature, and
the greatest scourge has been that of un-
clean literature. This last has it's victims
IN all occupations and departments. It
has helped to fill insane asylums, and
penitentiaries. and aims houses, and dens
of shame. The bodies of this infection
lie i'll the hospitals and in the graves, while
their souls are being tossed over into lost
eternity, an avalanche of horror and de-
Epair
Ihe London plague was nothing to it.
That counted its victims by thousands, but
this modern pest has already shoveled its
millions into the charnel house of the
morally dead. The longest rail train that
ever ran over the Erie and Hudson tracks
vas not long enough to carry the beastli-
ness and the putretaction which have been
gathered up III bad books and newspapers
Of this land in the last twenty years.
Now, it is amid such circumstances that [
put this morning question Of overmaster-
ing importance to you and your families.
What books and newspapers shall we read?
You see group them together. A news
paper is only a book in swifter and moro
portable shape, and the same rules which
will apply to book reading will apply TO
newspaper reading. What shall we read?
Shall our minds be the receptacle of every
thing that an author has mind to write?
Shall there be no distinction between the
tree OF life and the tree of death? Shall
We stoop down and drink out of the trough
which the wickedness of men has filled
with pollution and shame? Shall we mire
in impurity and chase fantastic will-o the
wisps across the swamps when we might
walk in tho blooming gardens of God? Oh,
no! For the sake of our present and ever
lasting welfare we must make an intelli-
gent Christian choice. Standing as we do
chin deep in fictitious literature, the first
question that many of the young people
are asking me is: "Shall we read novelist"
reply: There are novels that are pure,
good, Christian, elevating TO the heart and
ENROLLING to the life. But I have still
further to say that believe that ninety
nine out of 100 novels in this day are bale
full and destructive to the last degree. A
pure work of fiction is history and poetry
combined. 1t is history of things around
us with the licenses and the assumed
names of poetry, The world can never
pay the debt which It owes to such fiction
writer's as Hawthorne and Mckenzie, and
Iandon and Hunt, and Arthur and Marion
Harland, and others whose names are
familiar to all. The follios of high life
were never better exposed than by Miss
Edsaworth. The memories of the past
were never more faithfully embalmed than
in the writings of Walter Scott.
Cooper's novels are BEAUTIFULLY redolent
with the breath of the seaweed and the
mir of the American forest. Charles Kings
Icy has smitten the morbidity of the world,
ana led a great many to appreciate the
poetry Of sound health. strong muscles, and